Emma ran over to the opposite side of the bed to Rhydian. How could this have happened to her darling daughter?

'Dan, get me a flannel and a bowl of warm water, then go get my first aid box from the kitchen.' Emma's hysteria at seeing her daughter hurt melted away as she saw she had a job to do. She began to rip away Maddy's shirt to allow easy access to her wounds, whilst Dan hurried himself in the en suite with getting the water. 'What happened?' Emma asked sternly, not making eye contact with Rhydian.

'I don't know. It all happened so quick. I'm sorry I didn't have time to save her, I-'

Emma interrupted his mumbling. 'Rhydian,' her eyes now met his, 'what happened?'

Rhydian collected his thoughts and began. 'I came back to see how Maddy was doing, and to check that Shannon and Tom had kept their words to keep what we all are secret, and, in truth, because I've missed her.' Dan now entered with the water and then left to fetch the first aid kit. Emma began to clean the wounds. Neither of them knew what to make of what Rhydian had just said. If he cared so much, why did he leave? 'But, anyway… I was watching her from a tree,' he realised how that sounded when he said it, but carried on regardless for the sake of hurrying up, 'and Ceri had followed me and found me. She was unbelievably angry and we argued, and I suppose Maddy heard us, and that's when she came outside. But then when Ceri saw her, she snapped. She changed and attacked before I or Maddy could change and stop her. I only managed to get rid of her when she was about to attack again.' The pain of having to relive these events in his mind showed on Rhydians face. At this point he paused, feeling it was too much to describe the horror of the sight of Maddy lying on the forest floor after the attack. Instead he decided to continue his apologies and self-hating. 'I'm so sorry Mrs Smith, truly. If I could swap places with her, then I would, in a heartbeat. If I could only have stopped Cer-'

'Look, all of these 'ifs' aren't going to change anything now, and they're certainly not going to help Maddy.' Emma's tone had suddenly become softer, she could see that Rhydian really was as distressed as, and did care for Maddy as much as, herself and Dan, but her voice still held the seriousness of the situation. 'If you want to help her, look in that cupboard for some thicker blankets, we need to keep her warm.'

Dan returned after this exchange with the first aid kit. As Emma had been re-joined with her medical companion, and the wound was now clean, she set about trying to improve the wounds. She stitched the deep cuts, sterilised them with a strong smelling, honey-coloured liquid, and tried to stop her daughter from getting cold, all with the help of Rhydian. When everything had been done that could be, and Maddy was in a less painful sleep than before (thanks to some very strong painkillers), Maddy's mum tried to convince Rhydian to go get some sleep in the spare room as herself and Dan were going to bed also. Maddy would not wake for hours. However Rhydian refused and decided to spend all night in the chair next to Maddy's bed. He couldn't leave her now when she needed him, not again.

'How is she?' Dan asked, nervous for the reply, as he and his wife got into bed at two in the morning.

'Honestly?' She sighed as she faced up to the facts of the scenario. 'She's not good. She'll heal and she'll live, but it's going to be painful for a while yet. I just wish the full moon was tonight so that it could heal her. And even then, she might still be scarred for the rest of her life. 'All was quiet as they both took in the idea of their beautiful daughter being scarred forevermore.

'How's he doing?' Dan questioned a few moments later. It was beginning to sound as though he felt sympathetic towards Rhydian. But Mr Smith had a hard look on his face to contradict this idea, surely he couldn't feel sympathy after all of the pain and suffering the person in question had caused his only child?

'He's not so good either. He can't stop blaming himself, and he won't move from her bedside.' She let out another thoughtful sigh and went on. 'I hate to say this after everything that has happened, but I think we've been wrong about him. He does really seem to care about Maddy.' Dan's face was pulled in shock at his wife's revelation, so she took the silence as an opportunity to put her point across fully before he argued back. 'I know he left, and I know it broke her heart to lose him, and I know we called him selfish for it. But what if we were wrong? What if at first he was selfish and left for himself, but then, what if he too was unhappy and only stayed away to protect her because he knew returning would cause, well, this?'

'But if that was the case,' Daniel considered, 'wouldn't he have stayed away and not come back now?'

'Maybe he felt the same without her as she has without him? He might not have been able to bear it any longer. He said to me that he only meant to check up on her by coming back, he didn't mean to actually stay, or even let her know he came at all. Maybe he thought Ceri wouldn't know and he'd get to see Maddy and keep her safe?' Emma tried to reason with her other half, but in all honesty, both of them were too exhausted for this conversation now. It had been a long day, and what felt like an even longer night.

'Who knows?' was Daniel's tired reply. 'But I'm keeping an eye on him, either way. And if he has come back to stay, he's got a lot of making up to do, that's for sure,' he added, before snuggling down into bed next to his wife, and falling asleep just as another in the house was awakening.